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celestial harmony

Listening to music helps me concentrate at work. Music with words is too distracting, but all kinds of classical and jazz works for me, as well as various kinds...

Listening to music helps me concentrate at work. Music with words is too distracting, but all kinds of classical and jazz works for me, as well as various kinds of atmospheric sounds, natural or constructed.Lately I’ve been enjoying audio transcriptions of electromagnetic field measurements taken by NASA’s Voyager probe,which I got from iTunes.(My son David, who has a degree in psychoacoustics, turned me on to this.)As has often been noted,the sounds of space are unearthly...

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solar eclipse backyard adventure

Sunday's eclipse was lovely here in San Jose. My sons and I made some impromptu observations in the backyard. The best picture is of crescent-shaped shadows...

Sunday's eclipse was lovely here in San Jose. My sons and I made some impromptu observations in the backyard. The best picture is of crescent-shaped shadows under the leaves on our ash tree.

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advice from a master teacher

My father Greig Rose was a college science teacher for about 35 years, mostly at West Valley College. He also served on faculty at West Point. As a youngster I...

My father Greig Rose was a college science teacher for about 35 years, mostly at West Valley College. He also served on faculty at West Point. As a youngster I learned the genetic code watching him teach the cadets. Later on, interesting classes were routinely available to me. Growing up in an educator's house was a privilege and a blessing. It is one of the main reasons I have been directly involved in my own children's education, to the point of home schooling and volunteer...

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when nerds call customer service

I'm proud of my home network and maintain it out to the phone company point-of-presence. When the service provider's DSL line goes out due to an external short,...

I'm proud of my home network and maintain it out to the phone company point-of-presence. When the service provider's DSL line goes out due to an external short, I need to open trouble ticket with their phone line people. How hard could that be?

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a beautiful life

Just about 24 hours ago, I was working on invokedynamic compilation in my hotel room with colleague Christian Thalinger. I have since learned that around that...

Just about 24 hours ago, I was working on invokedynamic compilation in my hotel room with colleague Christian Thalinger. I have since learned that around that time, my dear grandmother, wise and loving to the end, slowly breathed her last and went to be with her Maker.I suppose this is a strictly personal event, but as beautiful things deserve be shared, I would like to provide a glimpse of what this woman was like, in a photo of her and me taken 18 months ago.That picture...

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the date of Christmas comes more from Easter than the winter solstice

Christmas can be enjoyed as a much needed vacation day, a cheery cultural pageant, or a profound spiritual observation. For my part, I’ll take generous helpings...

Christmas can be enjoyed as a much needed vacation day, a cheery cultural pageant, or a profound spiritual observation. For my part, I’ll take generous helpings of each. As it is a widely shared holiday, the first question is where to put it on the calendar. Thanks to Julius Caesar and his calendrical reforms, and to their enthusiastic adoption by the early Christian Church, we possess a clear date for Christmas.Because it is based on the solar calendar, there are none of the...

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three software proverbs

Today I was late for lunch. As I walked to the cafeteria, pondering my work, this haiku came to me:It will take more time:If you touch it, it will...

Today I was late for lunch. As I walked to the cafeteria, pondering my work, this haiku came to me:It will take more time:If you touch it, it will break...Software is wily.Relaxing the syllable count limit in favor of word count gives each epigram a fuller and more independent expression:Somehow it always takes longer:If you touch it, it will break...Software is a wily opponent.Those latter three lines express the way I feel about my chosen craft.I think of the middle line as...

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destroy the home schoolers in order to save them

Some of my colleagues have noticed the news flurry about home schooling and the sudden declaration of its illegality by a panel of federal judges in Los...

Some of my colleagues have noticed the news flurry about home schooling and the sudden declaration of its illegality by a panel of federal judges in Los Angeles. The formal decision features a spicy stew of judicial threats to parents, in a section entitled “Consequences of Parental Denial of a Legal Education”.That certainly got my attention and that of many friends, since (dare I now admit?) I've been home schooling my children since 1987. Two have finished with honors at...

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it's a beautiful thing...

I just browsed the gift catalog at Heifer International, http://www.heifer.org.Here is a truly great antidote to all those worst-of-the-season ads urging you to...

I just browsed the gift catalog at Heifer International, http://www.heifer.org.Here is a truly great antidote to all those worst-of-the-season ads urging you to "give yourself a gift" of whatever the advertiser is selling.The idea is to give a family in some other part of the world an animal which can help them create food and clothing. What a cheerful, hopeful charity!My grandmother, Evenlyn Ashbrook, has been giving us "kids" Heifer gifts for Christmas over the last half...